RUBANDA, UGANDA: The State Minister for Economic Monitoring Beatrice Akello Akori has handed over two Rubanda district officials to the State House Anti-Corruption Unit for investigation over alleged causing financial loss to the government that resulted from negligence.
The officials including the district Engineer Mr Denis Twesigomwe, and the District Water Officer David Otuke were discovered to have caused financial loss to the government during the monitoring of government projects in the district on Tuesday.
According to the minister, it was discovered that Twesigomwe in his capacity as the district engineer sanctioned Ricky Construction Company that had contracted the construction shillings 485 million shillings structure at Mpungu Health Centre III in Hamurwa town council during the 2019/2020/2021 financial year yet it had developed cracks before handover.
At the same facility, Twesigomwe was also accused of keeping a deaf ear about the same contractor installing a substandard solar system.
On inspection of Mpungu health centre III, the Hamurwa sub-county LC3 Chairman Stanislaus Nyaraare attributed the cracks to the narrow foundation which the contractor dug and could now not hold the building minus developing glitches. Nyaraare said that their cries against the contractor over shoddy work were not listened to by Twesigomwe.
The Rubanda District LC5 Chairman Stephen Ampeire Kasyaba accused Otuke, the Water Officer of failing to explain how a stalled shilling 6.2 billion Bushura water supply project was implemented in Hamuhambo town council and Bubaare Sub County during the financial year 2019/2020 Yet the district had no capacity to fund it. The project stalled after the district had already injected 677 million shillings.
He added that as a result, the Rubanda district council has already moved a motion to withdraw the project because it was created out of poor planning but under political influence.
As she tasked them to explain, Otuke argued that he guided the then-district council not to implement the project, but was overpowered whereas Twesigomwe argued that he tried to supervise the project and on discovering anomalies, the contractor promised to redo them.
This forced the minister to hand the duo to officials attached to the State House Anti-Corruption Unit for investigations over failure to use their office to save government funds from going to waste.
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